Birmingham Hippodrome
November 22, 2024
Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas in Birmingham with Sir Peter Wright’s The Nutcracker. Undoubtedly the best production of the ballet in this country by some distance, it’s once again casting its spell over audiences at the Hippodrome, wrapping them in a warm embrace.
The ballet culminates in the Grand pas de deux, Drosselmeyer magically turning Clara into the Sugar Plum Fairy. Céline Gittens and Yasiel Hodelín Bello glided through it with ease and with great confidence in one another. And joyfully too. It’s a while since I’ve seen such a happy looking Sugar Plum.But those few minutes are really just the icing on what is still a very tasty cake, even if you’ve had numerous slices over the years.
in Sir Peter Wright’s The Nutcracker
Photo Johan Persson
The Nutcracker is really about Clara, of course, danced here by the excellent Sofia Liñares, who gave a convincing performance as a teenager, but who hadn’t yet lost that childlike wonder. She and Enrique Bejarano Vidal, her boyfriend in all but name, made a fine couple at the Act One party. It’s after that gathering when the character really comes into her own, though. She and the young looking Hodelín Bello were perfect partners in the Act One pas de deux, danced to what is the most glorious music in the ballet.
Psychologists will tell you that dreams tell you what you really know about something, what you really feel. They never lie. That Act One pas de deux hints romance, and maybe feelings that Clara really has for her (unnamed, which always seems a shame) dancing partner. And why not, as the Nutcracker Prince is effectively him.
Photo Johan Persson
In Act Two, Liñares was constantly wreathed in smiles as delight after delight was shown to her. And what a masterstroke it was of Wright to let Clara join in with all the divertissements, this keeping the narrative going.
Conducting Clara through her dream, Max Maslen was an excellent Drosselmeyer with just a touch of mystery.
Part of the fun of Nutcracker is spotting the little changes or slightly different interpretations that come most years. At the house party, did I detect a slightly more attentive to his wife (Daria Stanciulescu) and animated than usual Jonathan Payn as Clara’s father?
Photo Johan Persson
Elsewhere, Grandfather Rory Mackay delighted everyone after being persuaded (it doesn’t take much!) to dance. Of the dancing toys, and under his layers of stretchy material, Riku Ito bounced and turned effortlessly as the Jack-in-the-Box. Clara’s naughty younger brother just didn’t feel naughty enough, though.
The two big set-piece ensemble dances were as spectacular as ever, led by Yu Kurihara and Miki Mizutani as the Rose and Snow Fairies respectively.
from Sir Peter Wright’s The Nutcracker for Birmingham Royal Ballet
Photo Johan Persson
The divertissements all delight. The new Chinese Dance (Ryan Felix and Gus Payne), a vast and necessary improvement on what went before, has bedded in nicely and looks like it was always there. Having gone through a number of changes in recent years, including trying it as a vaguely romantic pas de deux, it was good to see the Arabian Dance (Eilis Small, Jack Easton, August Generalli and Mason King) back to its original, sensual form.
Dreams are ultimately about waking up, of course, and that’s precisely what a very sleepy Clara does. And who wouldn’t be very tired after an adventure like that? But very happy too, just like the audience as they made their way back out into the Hurst Street chill.
Birmingham Royal Ballet perform The Nutcracker at the Birmingham Hippodrome to Saturday December 14, 2024.
The company’s Royal Albert Hall version of the ballet is then on in London from December 29-31, 2024.